World Of Warcraft Movie Lives Again With New Screenwriter

In the long history of movie studios trying to turn video games into feature films, World of Warcraft-- along with Halo maybe-- has been one of the biggest white whales. As far back as 2006 we were reporting on plans for a film adaptation of the hugely popular role-playing game, and in 2009-- a time so innocent we still thought Spider-Man 4 would happen-- Sam Raimi signed on to direct it. Yes, those were glorious days indeed.

It was just recently that Raimi confirmed he was no longer making the Warcraft movie, and that made the first news we'd heard about the project in nearly two years, usually a strong suggestion that the whole enterprise had run out of gas. But now Variety tells us that Charles Leavitt, the writer behind Legendary's upcoming fantasy film The Seventh Son, is the latest director hired to tackle the script.

They also suggest that the studio is high enough on Leavitt's idea that he could get the project back in working order again, including a search for a director. But don't get too excited just yet-- we've been down this road on so, so many high-profile video game adaptations, and to this date there's yet to be a really successful one. World of Warcraft: The Movie is far less dead than it seemed, but it's still a long way from being real.